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Getting to know Steve16 March 2018
Steve – a strange shimmering ribbon of purple light in the night sky – was discovered in 2016, but now, thanks to ESA’s Swarm mission, more is known about this weird feature of the aurora.

Full house for EDRS13 March 2018
The EDRS–SpaceDataHighway has now begun regularly relaying Earth images from Sentinel-2A, which marks the last of four Copernicus satellites in orbit being brought under the EDRS service.

Voyaging for the Sentinels09 March 2018
Two recent expeditions that took scientists 26 000 km across the Atlantic Ocean have returned critical information to make sure that the Copernicus Sentinel satellites are delivering accurate data about the state of our oceans.

World-first firing of air-breathing electric thruster05 March 2018
In a world-first, an ESA-led team has built and fired an electric thruster to ingest scarce air molecules from the top of the atmosphere for propellant, opening the way to satellites flying in very low orbits for years on end.

Donor star breathes life into zombie companion 05 March 2018
ESA’s Integral space observatory has witnessed a rare event: the moment that winds emitted by a swollen red giant star revived its slow-spinning companion, the core of a dead star, bringing it back to life in a flash of X-rays.

ESA incubators ranked among world´s best 02 March 2018
Two ESA business incubators have been ranked fourth and seventh in the world classification of university-affiliated incubators evaluated in 53 countries.

Mars Express views moons set against Saturn's rings01 March 2018
New images and video from ESA’s Mars Express show Phobos and Deimos drifting in front of Saturn and background stars, revealing more about the positioning and surfaces of the Red Planet’s mysterious moons.

Swarm trio becomes a quartet22 February 2018
With the aim of making the best possible use of existing satellites, ESA and Canada have made a deal that turns Swarm into a four-satellite mission to shed even more light on space weather and features such as the aurora borealis.

Goonhilly goes deep space22 February 2018
Until now, if you’re an entrepreneur planning future missions beyond Earth, you’d have to ask a big space agency to borrow their deep-space antennas. Now, thanks to the UK’s county of Cornwall and ESA, you’ll have a commercial option, too.

Surfing complete21 February 2018
Slowed by skimming through the very top of the upper atmosphere, ESA’s ExoMars has lowered itself into a planet-hugging orbit and is about ready to begin sniffing the Red Planet for methane.